The 12 Worst States for 2023-2024 COVID-19 Wave Death Rates

In June, COVID-19 looked as if it was going away. Then, in early July, hospitalization counts started to rise. Death rates began to increase about four weeks later. Hospitals and state public health agencies are sending less COVID data and less death data to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. But HHS compilations of hospital data show that COVID killed 19,877 people from the week ending July 29, 2023, through the week ending March 23. The weekly COVID death counts bottomed out at around 350 in July. From the end of July through late March, the country ended up averaging about 564 COVID deaths per week, or 61% more deaths per week than in mid-July. At the state level, reported COVID death rates for the 2023-2024 wave range from zero, in Massachusetts, Minnesota, New Hampshire, New Mexico and West Virginia, up to more than 20 deaths per 100,0000 people in two states, with a median of 2.7 reported COVID deaths per 100,000 residents. For the 12 states with the worst COVID death rates, see the gallery above. For data on all 50 states and the District of Columbia, see the table below. What it means: The United States was averaging about 2.8 million deaths per year before COVID showed up, in early 2020. COVID is no longer killing more than 500,000 people per year, but it still seems to be killing about 30,000 people per year, or about as many people who are killed each year by diabetes without specified complications, according to CDC Multiple Cause of Death data for the period from 2018 through 2021. Deaths from all causes: The CDC compiles a separate set of data, based on reports from state public health agencies, that shows deaths from all causes. Because some states take a long time to send the CDC their data, the numbers take about three or four weeks to start to firm up. The latest CDC all-cause death counts were posted March 29. For the period from late July through the week ending March 16, the CDC has recorded 1.86 million deaths from all causes. The total death count for that period is 13% higher than the total U.S. death count for the comparable period running from late July 2018 through late March 2019. Death counts for 2024 continue to be elevated. The CDC is now reporting 264,981 deaths for the four-week period ending Jan. 27, or 18% more than it reported for the first four weeks of 2019 as of the same point in 2019. For the four-week period ending Feb. 24, the CDC is reporting 239,834 deaths, or 12% more than it was reporting for the comparable period in 2019 at the same point in 2019. The United States appears to be on track to record about 336,000 more deaths this year than in 2019, because of COVID, the effects of COVID on the health care system and increases in mortality from other causes. The overall increase in the number of deaths is comparable to the population of Boulder, Colorado. The increase is about twice as high as the number of U.S. residents killed by cases of heart disease related to hardening of the arteries, according to the CDC Multiple Cause of Death files.